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AN ADDRESS 



DELIVERED 



IN THE CHURCH AT PRINCETON, 

THE EVENING BEFORE THE 

ANNUAL. COMMENCEMENT 

OF THE 

COLLEGE OF NEW-JERSEY, 

SEPTEMBER 27, 1831. 



BY GEORGE M. DALLAS, EsauiRE 



PUBLISHED AT THE REaUEST OF THE AMERICAN "WHIG 
AND ClilOSOPHIC SOCIETIES. 

PRIKCIiTOir, IT. J, 

PRINTED FOR THE SOCIETIES, BY D'HART AND CONNOLLY. 



c^t 






» 



EXTRACT FROM THE MINUTES OF THE CLIOSOPHIC SOCI- 
ETY, AT ITS ANNUAL MEETING, SEPT. 28, 1831. 

Resolved^ That a committee be appointed to present to George M. 
Dallas, Esq., the thanks of this Society, for the able and eloquent 
address, delivered by him on Tuesday, the 27th instant ; and to request 
a copy for publication. 

Committee, Prof. Albert B. Dod and Samuel Bayard, Esq. 



EXTRACT FROM THE MINUTES OF THE AMERICAN WHIG 
SOCIETY, AT ITS ANNUAL MEETING, SEPT. 28, 1831. 

Resolved, That a committee be appointed to present to George M. 
Dallas, Esq., the respectful acknowledgments of the American 
Whig Society, for the able and eloquent address, delivered by him 
on the 27th instant ; and to request him to furnish this Society with a 
copy for publication. 

WILLIAM C. ALEXANDER, Esq. ) 

J. PRINGLE JONES, > Committee. 

JOHN FORSYTH, Jr. S 



AN 



ADDRESS, 



Ladies and Gentlemen ! 

There are some present — tho' the eyes, the smiles, and 
the complexions of youth remind me there can be but few — 
who may remember that he, who has now the honor to address 
them, quitted this very platform, bidding farewell to collected 
friends and to coUegiate hfe, exactly one and twenty years 
ago. My young brethren, in obedience to whose summons 
I must awhile trespass upon your attention, have since sprung 
into existence: — have been carefully fashioned by the hands 
of parents and of preceptors : — and will to-moiTow, w4th spirits 
as buoyant and hopes as exhilarating as mine then were, 
launch upon the boundless, the uncertain, but ever attractive 
world ! — I come, hke the veteran mariner, to consult with them 
on their contemplated voyage : — to hint how they may best 
provide for its happy progress and its honorable end : — and 
to give them the onward cheer and hearty benediction of a 
brother and a friend. 

The step — the bounding and eager step — which clears the 
student at once from the secluded field of education and dis- 
cipline, and lands him to participate in the busy and bustling 
hum of men, is equally interesting and irrevocable. In this 



country, perhaps more than elsewhere, peculiar manneris 
invest a graduated youth with the dignity, and exact from 
him the responsibility, of manhood. He no sooner ceases to 
be under collegiate government, than he is presumed com- 
petent, and expected, to govern himself. The instant he 
turns his back upon the symmetrical and flowery walks of 
academical culture, he moves, unaided, upon the irregular 
and entangled heath of general society. Heretofore the object 
of solicitude and protection, he must now be self-adjusted, 
self-poised, and self-sufficient ! The epoch of such a transition 
is naturally one of thrilling anxiety to his relatives and friends. 
The tender and sustaining ties of sympathy are about being 
relaxed, if not severed : — the exclusiveness of domestic affec- 
tion must be dispelled : — and the multifarious claims of society 
suddenly interpose to terminate forever the delights and the 
security of filial dependence. If, indeed, the roseate hues of 
a hope yet unblighted gild every prospect to the adventurer's 
vision: — if he, indeed, stand upon the shore and stretch his 
delighted gaze over a sunny ocean of life, shadowing forth 
unerring and brilliant tracks of happiness, tranquility, and 
glory: — these are delusions which the chastened imaginations 
of parents and of guardians cannot indulge. To them, 
however fond and confiding, the future is fiiU of danger and 
of doubt. To them, the last exercise of preparatory education 
is but the beginning of a real struggle, and the emancipation 
from pupilage, an inevitable exposure to the burdens and 
buffets incident to humanity. 

Let me not, however, too intensely aggravate the interests 
of the occasion. If it be accompanied by painful apprehen- 
sions, it also has its bright and renovatmg aspects. 



What cordial more sweet to a parent than the intellectual 
and moral ascendancy of a son ? To see hun, after many 
years of probation, step forth from among his associates and 
competitors, and, in the presence of approving judges, claim 
the well-earned reward of \TLrtuou3 deportment, prolonged 
industry, and cultivated mind? To know, and feel, and 
witness, the crowning conclusion of a work so long and so 
devotedly labored ? To have the elated heart whispering at 
every throb its consciousness of kindred and of triumph: — 
and to receive him, on retiring from this edifice, no longer 
as dependent offspring, but as the dearest and truest and best 
of companions, of friends, of equals ! Such a moment yields a 
rich and more than compensating harvest for every toil. It 
sheds the sweetest obHvion upon all past solicitudes, and in- 
spires a cheerM readiness for future and united trials. 

Nor is it fair, by dull homilies, however true and philo- 
sophical, to take from our young friends their keen relish of 
this peculiar period. They have run the scholastic race : — 
they have attained the goal : — the victors await their prizes, 
and even the vanquished are refreshed, strengthened, and 
ennobled by their wholesome exercise and their generous com- 
petition. Let them enjoy the fruits of time thus far profitably 
spent: — and let us rather share in the sangviine feelings and 
anticipations by which they are prompted, as auspicious of 
coming victories, than unseasonably blunt theii- rapture by the 
stale though sound admonitions of age and of experience. 

I turn then. Gentlemen of the American Whig and Clio- 
sophic Societies, to congratulate you upon having reached 
the termination of your collegiate course: — and to discharge 
the duty which you flatteringly assigned to me. 



8 

Although about to leave your revered instructors and 
beloved associates, — to quit forever this region long and suc- 
cessfully devoted to the delightful pursuits of literature and 
of science: — I am aware that your bosoms swell high with 
anticipations of home, of fancied free-agency, and of aug- 
mented personal importance. You are prepared, and eager, 
for the change — and it is right that you should be so. Loftier 
duties than any 3^et undertaken await and invite the exercise 
of moral and mental faculties now ripened into usefulness and 
energy. It is not that you are insensible to the advantages 
heretofore enjoyed : — it is not that you are ungrateful for 
the wise and affectionate supervision w^hich has borne with 
the waywardness and frivolity of youth, and gradually 
guided you to your honorable position : — but it is, that your 
instructors have, almost unconsciously to yourselves, imparted 
powers which impel to activity — have given you an armour 
whose efficacy you wish to test — have made you fit, and 
thence instilled the resistless desire, to mingle with your 
fellow-men. 

The extent to which this spirit of adventurous resolution 
may be beneficially indulged, henceforward depends entirely 
upon yourselves. Your own hands must feed the lamps until 
now kept burning by others. I need hardly say that the 
basis formed by the past accumulations of education must 
not only be preserved fi'om decay, but should steadily and 
unremittingly be enlarged and perfected. It is a law of 
mind: — intellect stagnates as soon as it is stationary. You 
must be ^ improving, or you will retrograde and degenerate. 
The strength now possessed is weakness compared with that 
which must hereafter be embodied. And refraining to touch 



farther upon the importance of your recent studies, and their 
persevering cultivation, than is involved in these general 
remarks, there is one of them as to which I cannot withhold 
the testimony of my strong conviction. In the knowledge of 
the classic languages of antiquity, you have master-keys 
wherewith to open store-houses, yet unapproached, of learn- 
ing, of taste, and of enjoyment: — exhaustless granaries of 
moral aliment : — vast arsenals wherein are hoarded, forever 
polished and powerful, the weapons and ammunition of the 
understanding. How easy a thing to keep these keys within 
your grasp ! — to retain thus a freedom of access to the noblest 
of the, human race; the peerless Grecian, the exalted Roman, 
the wise of almost every age, and the elect of almost every 
land ! Let them rust upon your hands, or be negligently 
lost, and, like the fabled Peri, you will fruitlessly flutter round 
the walls, or vainly knock at the gates, of Paradise. 

While I am thus standing with you at the barrier which 
divides the college from the crowd, the silent shades of study 
from the glittering and tumultuous ways of the world : — a 
barrier which to-morrow's sun will see you overleap: — permit 
me cursorily to inculcate a principle of future action, whose 
direct tendency is to confirm your virtue, to elevate your mo- 
tives, to invigorate the prosecution of upright pursuits, and to 
perpetuate the peace and composure of your hearts. It is 
not for me to meddle with the paramount precepts of religion 
or morahty : I shrink from any vain attempt to fortify the 
admonitions of your pious, learned, and venerated chief — 
But I would fain, in the fulfilment of my humbler task, 
furnish you a clue through many chambers of the labyrinth 
you are about entering, and impress upon your memories, a 

B 



10 

maxim, to which you can never iinprofitably nor reluctantly 
recur. 

Gentlemen — you are American citizens. The immense 
throng of thirteen millions of human beings who surround 
you — their admirable institutions of government — their laws, 
usages, and language — their vast territory, noble rivers, luxu- 
riant valleys, and interminable plains — their science, their 
letters, their liberties, their exploits, and their renown : — all 
these constitute your country ; and I say to you, as the first 
of lessons, as well for individual happiness as for social duty, 
reverence and love your country ! Take what occupation 
you may ; agricultural, professional, mechanical — pursue it 
with ever so much zeal, talent, and tact; amass wealth and 
acquire sway; if you do not reverence and love your country, 
there will be a bitter and embittering void within your bo- 
soms, making every acquisition distasteful, and converting 
every fruition into disappointment. But learn to love your 
country strongly : be that an ever-present and fundamental 
principle of public or of private conduct, stimulating you to 
useful examples, or checking the aspirations of ambition ; 
and success will come without alloy, as adversity may over- 
take without reproach. 

The love of country, however, to which I refer, is not that 
commonplace sentiment w^iich germinates without root upon 
the rank soil of affectation, or shoots, unbidden and unawares, 
from ignorant instinct. The mere natural attachment to the 
region of nativity or of residence, is, in itself, though amiable, 
too fragile for reliance, too slight for constant or severe ser- 
vice. Let your's be the combined product of true feeling 
and discriminating reason ; of comprehensive surveys, both 



mt 



11 

historical and contemporaneous ; of a preference, calmly and 
conclusively adjudged. Thus only can it outlive the unceasing 
assaults of selfishness, or prevent the corroding effects of 
those temporary crosses or casualties to which we are aU 
doomed. 

Shall I then venture merely to indicate why you should 
reverence and love your country ? — to advert to some of the 
many causes which w^arrant and justify it, in its most ardent 
and profound condition? The theme cannot readily tire, 
though essayed by an unskilful tongue, and is eminently 
appropriate to the occasion. 

Tlie scale, Gentlemen, upon which it has pleased the 
creative power to model this land, is that of united sublimity 
and utility. As an abode for intellectual beings, it is surpassed 
in grandeur of conformation, and in commodious connexion 
oi parts, by no portion of the globe. Ranging itself majesti- 
cally in front of the Atlantic Ocean from the twenty-fifth to 
the forty-seventh degree of latitude, it expands westward to 
the Pacific, three thousand five hundred miles. Its coast 
is penetrated by the noblest of estuaries. The undulations 
of its surface now swell into cloud-capt, but never bleak or 
inaccessible mountains : now sink into channels for vast, 
but never dangerous streams; and again stretch forth into 
boundless, but never baneful levels of fertility and of forest. 
The exuberance of its products, every where and unceasingly 
invites immigration, and rewards' industry. Its waters and its 
woodland equally throng* The buffalo of the prairies, or 
the bald-eagle of the peaks, is but the closing fink in a chain of 
animated nature, by which our soil and our air are enriched 
or adorned : and, almost spontaneously unveiled, the treasures 



12 

of mineralogy peer and sparkle from the earth, ministering 
alike to the " solid substance" and " feeble splendor" of its 
possessors. These are physical characteristics to which no 
patriot can be bhnd. They are the native and immutable 
qualities of his home ; inspiring content, awakening admira- 
tion, and constituting an enduring foundation for just pride. 
It may be that you have read of skies more deeply blue ; of 
lakes more poetically placid ; of scenery more abrupt, im- 
practicable, and romantic, than any this continent can furnish. 
Fancy, in these descriptions, has probably thrown her pris- 
matic embellishment over fact : but conceding otherwise ; — 
how shadowy and volatile seem all the mere amusements of 
taste, when contrasted with the ruddy offspring of America, 
the sterling realities of plenty, health, and happiness ! 

But, Gentlemen, this spacious mansion, with all its excel- 
lencies, is the humblest allotment of your inheritance. There 
are moral causes, far nobler and more impressive, to invigorate 
your love of country. 

Scarcely three centuries have elapsed, since first a civilized 
man beheld, in a mist of distance and of doubt, the regions 
we inhabit. When Sebastian Cabot, impelled by the example 
of the great discoverer, moved along the eastern margin of 
the present United States, and returned to his monarch and 
his merchants, without attempting either settlement or con- 
quest, not the feeblest ray of an impending future could have 
illumined his mind. He turned the prows of his barks away 
from these shores as irreclaimably savage : — and another hun- 
dred of years glided by, ere Raleigh trod the beach of Roanoke, 
or permanently encamped a pioneering detachment upon the 
banks of the Powhatan. In 1610, a small peninsula on the 



IS 

coast of Virginia, tenanted by a less number of human beings 
than the young brothers I address, was the germ, the grain 
of mustard-seed, on which depended the gigantic growth of 
the American nation ! The pilgrims of New-Plymouth fol- 
lowed, in 1620 ; and with a rapidity far transcending all 
experience and all hope, successive streams of civilization, 
like the rays of the sun, darted from the east, sped their 
searching and fertilizing course through a wilderness, and 
awoke to its high destiny the fairest and freshest portion of 
the earth! 

And have you never asked, whence this wonderful work? 
Have you never scrutinized the basis of this mighty structure ? 
Approach it, Gentlemen, with confidence : you, at least, need 
not shrink from tracing the moral overflow to which you owe 
your country up to its remotest source. There are no wolf- 
bred bands of robbers at that fountain — no hordes of devasta- 
ting barbarians, impelled by w^ant, or a keen thirst for blood ; 
no flying criminals, dreading the avenging swords of justice — • 
from such an origin as either of these, a generous patriotism 
might avert its gaze. But how is the heart soothed and the 
mind lifted ; how powerfully fortified is our reverence for home, 
when we contemplate the virtuous, wise, peaceable, and pious 
men by whom this nation was founded? When we couple 
so extraordinary an achievement with their simple manners, 
their pure designs, their lofty motives, their meek resignation, 
and their unconquerable fortitude ! When we find that, in 
an age of refinement, and from that very quarter of the globe 
self-esteemed solely civilized ; in the days of Elizabeth and 
of Bacon — of Henry and of Sully — of Shakspeare, of Milton, 
our progenitors, enjoying all the blessings of moral and Intel- 



14 

lectual improvementj and all the sweets of polished life, sought 
in the sequestered shades of this unexplored land, its only, 
but its unalienable and inestimable treasures — untrammelled 
freedom of action, and uncontrolable liberty of conscience ! 
Philosophy can designate for contemplation nothing more 
sublime. History presents no parallel : for the callous and 
insatiable cupidity which made both eastern and western 
Indies, at periods of invading settlement, flow, with torrents 
of blood, or resound with the clank of chains, never degraded 
our national ancestry, nor polluted the air we breathe. It is 
cur's — our's exclusively, to boast an undefiled social origin, 
consistent alike with true religion, universal philanthropy, 
and the proudest conceptions of human worth. 

The moral influence of this peculiar feature of our story 
should operate unspent through all generations — steadily 
preserving us from the pernicious principles and practices 
shunned by the primitive fathers. Carry with you. Gentle- 
men, into the various occupations of active citizenship to 
which you are destined, a clear comprehension of its intrinsic 
excellence and a deep sense of its comparative superiority : — 
push your scrutiny into its details more amply than would be 
compatible with my present purpose or opportunity : — it will 
confirm sentiments of practical importance, and persuasively 
teach you to reverence and love your country. 

These retrospections, though fortunately unaccompanied by 
any degrading consciousness of degeneracy, are not perhaps 
essential to present patriotism. The spirit of the first colonists 
was cherished like a sacred fire. It presided, as a territorial 
genius, over a rapidly augmenting population. It was 
inherently and inflexibly republican. And it gradually de- 



15 

veloped the doctrines and matured the measures upon which 
now repose the freedom and independence of the United 
States. But I come to call your attention to incidents of more 
recent date — to the glories which your immediate predecessors 
have achieved, and which you must contribute to perpetuate ; 
to the proud proofs that no nation is more entitled than this 
to the honor, gratitude, and devotion of its citizens. 

Whence was it, Gentlemen, that the great and fundamental 
truths of civil and religious Uberty — truths which have har- 
bingered the disenthralment and happiness of myriads of 
human beings — truths which, penetrating the recesses of 
superstition and oppression, have dispelled and destroyed them, 
as fluids glide into the fissures of rocks, and, expanding by 
congelation, heave them from their seats, or rend them into 
fragments : — w^hence w^as it, that these truths received their 
final demonstration and everlasting impulse? Whence were 
they sent forth, wdth the solemnity of national emphasis, as 
the recognized rules, alike of Divine beneficence and worldly 
wisdom — of Providence and of policy — without which modes 
of faith are but varied shades of folly, and forms of govern- 
ment mere meshes for slaves ? In accomplishing the political 
separation of your country from Great Britain, its sages 
legislated and philosophised for all mankind, and for all ages. 
They have placed the w^orld under an obligation which can 
be cancelled only by its frank acknowledgment. Do I 
exaggerate? Let the entire continent of America, rescued 
from Spanish tyranny and inquisitions; the thirty-five 
millions of France, unyoked of feudahsm ; emancipated Ire- 
land, and revolutionized England; nay, let Europe, from her 
hundred communities, and even wretched Africa, answer the 



16 

question. Let them say to what radiant source they trace 
the Hght which has shone upon them in the fruition of its 
full blaze ; or the cheering promise of its dawn. Let them 
say whence issued the loud psean which startled man, through- 
out their domains, from bondage and bigotry, to the enjoyment 
of those rights to which " the laws of nature and of natures 
God entitle him .'" 

And is not this something to exult in? Is not this youth- 
ful exploit better than twenty centuries of heraldry or of 
barbarous existence? Would you consent to exchange it for 
the Twelve Tables of Decemviral, or the fifty-volumed Pan- 
dects of Imperial, Rome? for the Canons of Papacy? or for 
the regal concessions of Magna Gharta ? It can never be an 
object of a disciplined mind to depreciate the value of these 
monuments of wisdom — but, contrasted with the luminous 
expositions of elementary and controling principles embodied 
in the declaration of our revolutionary Congress, and in the 
constitutions of the Union and of the respective States, they sink 
into utter insignificance. Gentlemen, on this score at least, 
your country can have no rival in your reverence and love. 

Look, then, to the structure of your public institutions — 
resting upon the will, and confiding in the virtuous intelli- 
gence of the multitude — as simple as wise, as practical as 
philosophical — the convenient, and conservative principle of 
representation, enabling a common government, both federa- 
tive and popular in its origin and its action, to retain, through 
an almost boimdless extent of territory, all the energy, while 
it avoids all the instability and disorder which accompanied 
the interesting and unmitigated democracies of antiquity. — 
Each free and independent State, itself a separate and secure 



k 



17 

depository of invaluable rights and powers, forms, by cboseti 
delegates, a part of one integral and essential branch of a 
national legislature : — an harmonious, though sub-divided — 
a consentaneous, though unamalgamated people compose, by 
their direct representatives, another branch : and the executive^ 
mostly springing from the source last mentioned, may yet, in 
one case, by a complicated and compromised arrangement, be 
considered to emanate equally from both — the States, as dis^ 
tinct sovereign bodies politic, and the people representatively 
collected in the constituent assembly. The judicial department 
— that balance-wheel of the whole structure, — with its duties 
and objects limited and defined, is also an offspring of the in- 
terwoven principles of federation and union : its incumbents, 
being designated by the elected executive, are but one remove 
farther from the original fountain of all just authority, and 
being subject to confirmation or rejection by the Senatorial 
delegates, cannot exist except with the presumed assent of a 
majority of the free and independent States. But I may be 
trenching upon controverted theories, when my sole design is 
to impart a general idea: I therefore abruptly pause. It isj 
however, in reference to this social and political organization, 
that your patriotism should be strongly and steadily cultivated. 
Learn to appreciate, and resolve to sustain it. Compare it 
with the mischievous and cumbersome machinery, elsewhere 
reared in rude ages ; making the general welfare subordinate 
to individual aggrandizement ; inverting the order of Provi- 
dence, and giving power to a prince or a peer, while it 
ascribes weakness to a people; and repressing or mis-directing 
the ennobling impulses and salutary struggles of an innate 
and inextinguishable sense of natural equality. Unfold the 



# 



18 

pages of ancient or modern history, and as you mark the 
troubled course and disastrous effects of other systems, be 
prepared to exclaim : — 

"Such are the woes, when arbitrary pow'r, 
And lawless passion hold the sword of justice ! — 
If there be any land, as fame reports, 

Where common laws restrain 

A happy land, where circulating pow'r 
Flows through each member of th' embodied state: 
Sure, not unconscious of the mighty blessing, 
Her grateful sons shine bright with every virtue, 
Untainted with the lust of ionovation : 
Sure all unite to hold her league of rule 
Unbroken as the sacred chain of nature 
That links the jarring elements in peace." 

I cannot forbear, at this, the most appropriate stage of my 
remarks, warning you of an assault to which your love of 
country must, in the ordinary course of events, be early 
subjected. 

Few things excite more disgust in the ingenuous and 
disinterested mind of youth, than a first experience of the 
operations and uproar of party spirit. This seemingly in- 
separable companion of free institutions is encountered at the 
very threshold of public action : — long before you can perceive 
its contradictory tendencies, or ascertain its general effects : — 
long before you entirely abandon those Utopian views of 
human perfectibility, suggested by your own virtues, and yet 
unconfuted by the realities of life. Party spirit appears on 
the instant to be the antagonist of patriotism : reckless, tu- 
multuous, unsparing, changeable, and fanatic : — inaccessible 
to reason; unawed by truth, and unsusceptible of fear: — 



19 

forever urging to extremes : alike fulsome in its praise and 
malignant in its censure : content with nothing short of an 
idolj or a victim. Its wonderful activity, and its clamorous 
echoes, inspire an exaggerated estimate of its prevalence and 
power ; and a too hasty judgment sometimes pronounces 
condemnation upon a whole system, which is even slightly 
affected by what is deemed so perturbed and deforming an 
agency. 

It may, nevertheless, be, as some have insisted, that party, 
to a certain extent, is not only wholesome, but necessary, in 
a republic : that without it we should slumber in dangerous 
security : that freedom is a blessing not to be permanently 
enjoyed, except with indefatigable and jealous vigilance : and 
that, such is the imperfection of man, his purest feelings and 
designs, like the precious metals, must be alloyed by baser 
ones, before they can become practically useful or efficient. 
If the annals of many centuries be credited, a government 
like your's, founded upon and recognizing indefeasible rights, 
cannot exist without the incident of party spirit. It is the 
foaming eddy driven before, or the boiling wake following 
after, the ship of state : — seeming sometimes to present an 
insurmountable impediment to her progress, and sometimes 
to dash overwhelmingly in pursuit; — but always composed 
of the very element on which she floats, and contributing in 
turn to buoy and sustain her. 

A discriminating patriotism will not, then, be impaired by 
discovering this doubtful evil in constant association with the 
unquestionable good of constitutional government. You 
must withstand the first shock, and instead of turning away 
in the bitterness of sudden disappointment, be prepared, as 



20 

you cannot wholly destroy, to confront, to assuage, and to 
restrict its influence. 

The liveliest attachment to your country may be farther 
and rationally justified by recollections of a kind less abstract 
than those thus briefly referred to. 

Yisit for a moment, Gentlemen, the Temple of Fame. — 
Let fancy guide you, with Truth and History as your com- 
panions, up it's elevated steps, and into the resounding hall, 
where are congregated the sculptured images of all the wis©, 
the good, and the great. As you enter that vast rotonda, 
say, whence is he whose majestic statue fills the proudest, 
loftiest niche ? whence is he, towards whom ancient sages, 
heroes, and statesmen, starting from the crowded walls, seem 
to look and lean, as if acknowledging his supremacy? 
Whence is he, whom Leonidas, Thrasybulus, Aristides, and 
Epaminondas, grouped congenially together, are gazing at 
with deference and admiration : before the calm dignity of 
whose front, the blood-shot eye of Macedonian Alexander 
sinks rebuked, and even the accomplished Csesar throws his 
laurel crown away, sighing with the fatal memory of the Ru- 
bicon 1 Whence is he, towards whom Socrates points the 
attention of his pupil Alcibiades, as an illustration of the 
virtue he had fruitlessly inculcated? for whom, as a kindred, 
though superior spirit, Camillus, Cincinnatus, and Cato seem 
to glow with welcomes, and in presence of whose sublime 
simphcity, the Trajans and the Antonines are hiding the vain 
ornaments which encircle their brows ? Let us draw nearer 
to this pre-eminent object. As we approach, its recess enlarges, 
and, clustering around the pedestal of the chief figure, are 
jnany who seem principally to dehght in, and to boast of, their 



21 

association with him. Whence and who is he? — The whole 
world can answer. In the smooth adamant on which he 
stands, no one has thought it necessary to chisel his nativity 
or name. He is the one without parallel: — beyond all Grecian 
and all Roman fame: — never to be forgotten, never to be 
mistaken. 

It is certainly a source of elevating reflection, and no con- 
tracted ground for pride, that you are citizens of a country 
which, in its very infancy, has furnished this noblest speci- 
men of human excellence : which, while instructing and 
delighting mankind with her Franklin, her Madison, her 
Jefferson, her Adams, her Henry, her Hancock her Mont- 
gomery, and her Howard, could yet embody the varied qualities 
of these illustrious men in completing her chosen model and 
representative. Study, Gentlemen, study with the enthusiasm 
of artists, the character of this model. You will discover it 
to be, in eveiy trait and in all its grand proportions, purely 
and exclusively American. It is the unmixed creation of 
your own continent : — it will insensibly and irresistibly teach 
you to be national ; and I can suggest no more infallible 
means of arousing and confirming j^ou to reverence and 
love your country. 

But again: — throughout the two millions of square miles, 
composing the territorial surface of our twenty-four confede- 
rated sovereignties, variously populous, the arts of peace — of 
peace in its widest and wisest sense — are triumphant. The 
diversified and harmonious occupations of private life are 
every where pursued with energetic and unshackled industry. 
Human passions are neither exasperated nor subdued by 
even the semblance of military coercion. Nothing is seen, 



22 

nothing is known, nothing is acknowledgedj as the means of 
protection or redress, but the universal, conventional, and 
equal power of the Law. Hence the importance, and hence 
the high reputation, of those Judicial functionaries whose 
wisdom and integrity, whether in the sphere of each com- 
monwealth, or in that of their union, have illustrated the 
novelty, and maintained the firmness, of our institutions. 
They have been the " National Guards''' of our jurispru- 
dence: always at their posts, reconciling vivid doctrines of 
liberty with the exigencies of social order, and preserving, 
amid the untried bases of our system, the fundamental and 
immutable distinctions of right and wrong. To this peace- 
able phalanx. Gentlemen, a short experience and study will 
induce you to render the homage of your gratitude and 
veneration — while you cannot fail to perceive how immensely, 
though tranquilly, they have augmented the substantial virtues 
and true glories of your country. Wherever civilization is 
unequivocally established and progressive: — wherever the 
safety, honor and happiness of the mass of mankind, and 
the stability of nations are deemed worthier objects of attain- 
ment than the plundered trophies of aggressive war, or the 
Corinthian luxuries of palaces — there will be duly appreciated 
the learned triumphs and humanizing labors of a Parsons 
a Kent, a Wythe, a Tucker, a Tilghman, or a Marshal — 
there it will be owned that the American Judiciary may be 
proudly invoked to confirm and justify the ardor of American 
patriotism. 

Nor is this — perhaps the greatest — the only region of intel- 
lectual excellence to w^hich you may confidently appeal. The 
time has come when we may venture, without incurring the 



23 

hazard of a venomous sarcasm, to speak of achievements on 
the rugged heights of Science, or the velvet lawns of Litera- 
ture, as well as amid the boisterous waves of a some-time- 
since monopolized Ocean. " Who reads an American 
hook ?" was a contemptuous and taunting interrogatory, 
which became obsolete and absurd as rapidly as did the scoffed 
" hit of striped hunting^'' open its folds and spread forth a 
victorious star-spangled banner ! Within the short period of 
your own lives, (too near for dispassionate or unsuspected 
comment,) your country has moved onward with giant 
strides. She is still advancing. Join her, Gentlemen, join 
her, with elated hearts and approving judgments : join her, 
" to swell the triumph and partake the gale." 

Having thus superficially alluded to some of the causes 
and considerations which should engender and mature a fer- 
vent national loyalty in your bosoms, indulge me while I 
intimate its safest direction, and most efiicient use. 

The comparatively prodigious expanse and population of 
the United States, as well as juster modern conceptions of the 
true sources and solid foundations of social prosperity, repu- 
diate as alike unnecessary and injurious, the spirit and tem- 
per consequential upon Spartan tuition. Your education 
has not been designed nor adapted to mould you into haughty 
and exclusive heroes : to absorb all your faculties and feelings 
in the prospect or desire of becoming public benefactors or 
martyrs. Should, indeed, some unforeseen emergencies arise, 
bringing into conflict your personal ease or advantage, and 
your country's welfare : should her safety, interests, or re- 
nown, demand the immolation of self, even to the hfe, you 
would shame your ancestry by a moment's hesitation. But 



24 

such calls are seldom made in a land whose " ways are waya 
of pleasantness, and all her paths, peace." The patriotism 
which awaits them must languish unexerted and unrevealed, 
or debase its purity by the contrivances and expedients of a 
selfish ambition. It is not here — far and forever removed 
from transatlantic inroads and interventions — it is not here, 
where the designs of sectional Syllas or Catalines can be 
mocked into frustration and contempt : where the powers 
of government, though capable of interruption, cannot be 
usurped : where a free and fearless Press, stationed in no less 
than twenty-four detached citadels, makes conspiracy im- 
practicable, and treason preposterous : it is not here. Gentle- 
men, that aught but a morbid and undiscriminating imagina- 
tion can lead you to postpone the manifestations of your love 
of country to the remote times of war, or the silly scenes of 
sedition. No ! your lot is more fortunately cast ; every day, 
every hour, affords its appropriate occasion. Our truest patriot 
is he who is most distinguished by the practice of private 
virtues. The faithful application of natural or acquired capa- 
city ; the persevering labors of mental or of manual industry ; 
the vigorous development and useful adaptation of scientific 
knowledge ; the contributions of literary talent, pure in ten- 
dency, and attractive in taste — these, swelling the common 
stock of moral energy, physical power, and durable fame, 
erecting by slow and sure accumulations, till ^^ hills peep o'er 
hillsj and Alps on Alps arise^^ the towering monument of 
national greatness — these are the legitimate indications and 
ever-recurring exercises of American patriotism. Its pursuits^ 
in their motives and rewards, are not necessarily connected 
with the showy or sonorous gratifications of personal distinc- 



25 

tion. The unobtrusive tenor of individual industry may 
continue unnoticed ; dispensing its usefulness and energies, 
and reaping its blessings, within a seemingly limited sphere ; 
benefitting a nation, or a race, by progressive gradations so 
gentle as to be noiseless, and so minute as to be imperceptible. 
Resembling the living subterranean spring, which is betrayed 
rather than proclaimed by the verdure and fertility of which 
it is the invisible cause : its diamond current, inaccessible to 
the glare of day or the gust of notoriety, secretly minister- 
ing to the strength of the forest, the abundance of the field, 
or even the iragrance of the flower. 

Nor is it possible. Gentlemen, for the true lover of a coun- 
try whose institutions, however wisely designed and skilfuUy 
balanced, mainly depend for permanency upon the vigor and 
purity of public opinion, indolently to withhold the mite of 
his co-operation towards her advancement, or viciously to 
obstruct her progress by demoralizing examples. The slug- 
gard and the criminal are alike devoid of so impelling and 
chastening a principle. Their's is the indurated selfishness 
which coldly excludes communion, and absorbed in sensual 
enjoyment, can deduce no exalting motive from national re- 
miniscences, nor find a stimulant in the prospect of achieving 
good for others. Patriotism, linked almost fi-om moral neces- 
sity with a sisterhood of virtues, is irreconcilably and ever- 
lastingly hostile to sloth of mind or degeneracy of action. 
You cannot sincerely feel the sentiment, and yet be idle : 
you cannot pretend to it, and yet be bad. 

Enter, then, young citizens of a great and admirable 
republic, enter upon the exercise and enjoyment of this well- 
founded and lofty passion, with the conviction that its only 

D 



26 

wide and unobstructed highways are useful activity, private 
worth, and unvarying integrity. No occupation to which 
you can possibly be called is so humble as to be divested of 
patriotic tendency, if energetically pursued : and none is so 
high as to be harmless or honorable, if its purposes be igno- 
bly perverted. And may the benignity of an approving 
Providence give to your exertions through life, success and 
prosperity commensurate to yom* reverence and love of 
country ! 






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